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Monday, October 10, 2005

International BoyzNADaze Part 3 - Devin the Dude in Aarhus, Denmark

Holy crap, the boy did that shit again. Devin the Dude live in Aarhus. I'm still a bit floored from the 2 days of flying we had to accompany our 2 days of enjoying Aarhus, this little city in Denmark northwest and across the water quite a ways from Copenhagen. Devin the Dude performed at the Aarhus Took It Festival, an annual event that brings hip-hop talent to the city. Man...

BoyzNADaze Indeed. This is just an opening shot, 2nd night of the trip, throwed off in a bar somewhere, where they let us get behind the bar to take a photo, in fact they demanded it. Shout out to Top Dollar CLothing. I finally got the EAT - GRIND - SLEEP shirt I been feenin' for.

Anyway we took off from Houston at 3:30 Thursday afternoon and arrived in Aarhus at 1 p.m. Friday after stops in Frankfurt and Copenhagen.

The place is beautiful. We stayed at the Confort Atlantic Hotel and were immediately barraged by Scandanavian journalists -- and new friends.

And of course they put your boy in the Houston Suite. Feel theReal!

Anyway, I am so dazed right now that I'm going to let these photos do quite a bit of the talking for me. I'm off to Austin in the morning and man I'd like to see the bed before midnight (that's 7 a.m. Aarhus time).

That's Mats Nileskar from Sweden chatting with Devin there. He's like, I don't want to say the John Peel of Sweden, but he's a Swedish radio journalist/DJ who has been around forever, interviewed everyone in extreme depth (admittedly I was a little scared when he, being our first interview informed me that he needed at least an hour as this would be extremely in depth) and basically has kept Scandanavia up on the real for years. In fact he's been in Houston before, interviewed Scarface and produced a massive Screw Music special that aired on Swedish Radio a year or two ago I believe. My people from thescrewshop.com knowmtalmbout.

Anyway suffice it to say the interviews did not stop. I went over to the venue (TRAIN - Fucking amazing place, and the Aarhus Took It Promoters and staff are top notch. What's up Henning, Mary Ann, Henneke???? Thanks so much for everything!) and handled up on the soundcheck, then came back and smoked hash outside on the balcony while Devin talked on and on with the folks. Shit was great.

Um thanks Lars and everyone else who dropped a little of that stuff on your boys...

He even signed some autographs

To the roof:

Devin and my boy LARS! WHUT IT DEW LARS! THANKS SO MUCH AGAIN FOR THE HOSPITALITY!

Rasmus

That's Dru With The View right there from Oklahoma. He's producing a Devin the Dude DVD Documentary. The footage from Aarhus alone is worthy of a purchase. Anyway he's the man, and has been travelling with Devin documenting much of his goings on. He got some shit mayne.

Got to the club and Devin was straight up barraged with fans. I had to literally at one point squeeze up in between fools and push Devin to the backstage area to get him out of the fray. Backstage area had them free Tuborg beers and that insane buffet. I never ate somanysalmons as I did in Denmark this past weekend. I'ma write a song about it, maybe start a blog.

Then the show was a bout to start and boys got super prepared...

And then the shit was on. I'm serious yo, I don't care how painful the travel can be and I don't really care what we have to go through to have this experience, but being on the other side of the world and seeing a whole club full of Devin fans rapping along to every word and just going crazy, feels real good. I been following Devin's career since the Odd Squad days in like 1992 and man, seriously I always knew he had people all over the world feeling him. Even in Aarhus, Denmark, like whoa...

After Montreal where the people were freaking out, demanding he get back on stage even though he had no more music, tonight he brought one jam for a quick encore, "Right Now." Which we later re-enacted trying to make our flight from Chicago to Houston after a complete and thorough shake down at customs. Y'all knowmtalmbout.

That's the host for the night, Michael on the right, who also took REAL good care of us out there.

The next day we had off and well, still had a few interviews to do, but after that we just chilled with the Pimp A Lot Records posse. Masn, these cats took extra good care of us, even showed us some real sights. I'm serious, they're like some Palestinian hardcore gangsta rappers in Aarhus and they took us to Old Aarhus, like this totally historic, culturally significant part of the city where theyhave like samples of all these different Danish homes, where you can learn about Danish history, architecture and design (which is no joke) and like, whoa. It's like coming to Houston and having Willie D take you to the Menil Collection or some shit.

Here's some random shots of the day. I need to go the fuck to bed. My schedule is so throwed off man. Jet lag and all that is still attacking me.

Even Pimp A Lot making a DVD.

Then this crazy dude, with a drink in his hand stopped us for a GOOD HOUR I'M SERIOUS and gave us a history lesson about how Denmark is the oldest monarchy on the planet and he went off and literally started dancing and speaking in tongues and showing us his tongue at this point...

Then we went to a bar...

And drank Cuban beer. Like whoa, howdy neighbor.

At this point here, when I took the photo of Devin and Dru with the Pimp A Lot Posse, I started really losing it. Finally convinced them to take us back to the hotel, where in parting we promised to meet them again that night for a party. INstead, me and Dru went to see the Boot Camp Click at Train for literally about 20 minutes while Devin went to eat. After 20 minutes me and Dru looked at each other and were like man we gotta get out of here (not cuz of BCC, they fucking ripped it. More than I even expected, like it was some classic shit on that stage much respect to Buckshot and Smif N Wessun especially. I forgot how hard I used to jam the Shinin). Stepped across the street and bought hot dogs and french fries at a little stand, got a couple more beers, ate, smoked a last couple and passed the hell out. Serious, going to Europe for 2 days is not the best move. It's exhausting.

And apparently REALLY interesting to US Customs agents. When we arrived in Chicago, I didn't have any checked luggage so I told Devin and Dru that I was just gonna keep going thru customs and go outside and use my phone while they got luggage. Ha. I walked to the second passport control and they told me to please walk through the red lighted area and wait for an officer. So I did, where I was thoroughly (not strip searched, but thorough enough) searched and questioned. 5 minutes later, here comes the Dude, 2 minutes later here comes Dru. We were all seperated and questioned, but the only thing that could really get any of us in trouble was left as a lil tip for the maid at the hotel. Luckily I didn't go dumb and try to bring one of our many presents back... Cuz that would have been my ass. Blogging in the pen. Shit. Anyway, promoters of the world get ready ready we coming.

Devin the Dude in Vancouver and a few more cities in Western Canada either Halloween or late November???

Devin the Dude Austin Texas November 17th at Antones with Bavu Blakes and a special LIVE SET with D-Madness?

10 Comments:

hello matt!we're dropping hip hop/grime/bashment parties in berlin,germany. might be possible that we can add another date for bun b and all to the russia&finland ones in december. could you please get back to me with some information whom to contact to set this up? many thanxalexadbiz@sickgirls.de

and yea since you brought it up ;) Devin will be doing a few numbers with D-Madness' nine-piece band as an encore that night... apparently they've known each other for more than a decade. tryna complete that Nov17 lineup by thursday... chalie would be great, then one austin or dallas opener...

I'm from Denmark and of course i was at the shizznit in Aarhus with Devin. I had a picture taken with him and I had a t-shirt saying Devin IS the Dude. The Dude is major in Denmark. In hip hop circles he's in everyone's top five or some shit. That's all! Now I'll just leave and be smokin' weed, feelin' fine, steady getting blowed! Rasmus from Aarhus, Denmark